The subject matter disclosed herein relates to industrial process technology with particular discussion about systems and methods to identify assets on a process line using images of the assets in lieu of asset tags and/or other identifiers physically attached to the assets.
Industrial processes typically involve chemical, physical, electrical, and mechanical stages to manufacture items. The stages may utilize one or more process lines with devices that control certain aspects of the process. For process lines that carry fluids and/or transitory materials, the devices can embody flow controls that regulate a flow of the material.
A common type of flow control is a valve assembly or “control valve.” This valve assembly can include an electrical or pneumatic actuator that couples with a closure member (via a stem). The closure member may embody a plug, a ball, a butterfly valve, and/or like implement that can contact the seat to prevent flow. In pneumatic configurations, the valve assembly can include a control device, also called a valve positioner, which can regulate a flow of instrument gas into the actuator. The instrument gas can pressurize (and de-pressurize) the actuator in order to locate the closure member in position relative to the seat. During operation, the valve positioner can receive and process a control signal from a controller that is part of a process control system (also “distributed control system” or “DCS system”). The control signal can define operating parameters for the valve assembly in accordance with an appropriate flow of fluid from the valve assembly and into the process line. The valve positioner can use these operating parameters and the output from the position sensor to set the position desired for the closure member.
Installations in heavy industries like chemical manufacturing and resource recovery and refining are typically built to very large scale. These installations may use hundreds and even thousands of valve assemblies. In such installations, it is often necessary to periodically perform tasks to verify operation of the valve assemblies or, in worst cases, to remediate problems that result from errors and/or failures of a particular valve assembly or group of valve assemblies.
These tasks typically require personnel to find and identify valve assemblies on the process line. To facilitate identification, each valve assembly can include identifying information, typically an identifier or “asset tag” (like a metal plate) that attaches to the valve assembly. This identifier typically has human readable information (e.g., text) and machine readable information (e.g., bar codes) that distinguishes the valve assembly from the others. In practice, personnel may carry hardware (e.g., a scanner) that can read the machine readable information on the identifier. This practice can extract information stored in the identifier. Often, the information corresponds to information found on a construction diagram (also known as a “piping and installation diagram” or “P&ID diagram”) that defines the layout of the process lines. Use of this hardware and these diagrams can guide personnel to the appropriate locations to find the valve assembly of interest and confirm that the valve assembly is the correct device on which to perform maintenance.
Nonetheless, this process does not ensure that the identified valve assembly can carry the correct asset tag or other identifying feature. In order to use asset tags, for example, personnel may physically secure the asset tags (alone, or in combination with another identifier) to the valve assembly at the time of inventory, maintenance, and commissioning of the valve assembly on the process line. This process can introduce human error. It is possible, for example, for an asset tag to be mistakenly secured to the wrong valve assembly. In heavy industries, such errors can waste personnel time and effort, and can increase labor costs, because the shear size and scale of the installations can frustrate efforts to find and identify individual valve assemblies.
Moreover, it is common for the valve assembly to be located in areas that frustrate access for personnel to perform any visual recognition. These areas may require the personnel to climb, crawl, or otherwise physically scale obstacles to get into proximity of the subject valve assembly. When the process line and/or installation, generally, runs processes at extremely high temperatures or using caustic and dangerous materials, the requirement for physical proximity can place the personnel in danger.